The Rebisco-owned bank, Asia United Bank (AUB), will be the second bank and the second company this year to have an initial public offering (IPO).
The bank recently announced that it will be offering more than 88 million shares to the public for the first time, priced at P95 per share.
Just a month after the Philippines received its first-ever investment grade rating from Fitch Ratings, another credit rating agency gave the country its stamp of approval by bestowing upon the Philippines a BBB- rating, equivalent to a lower medium investment grade.
Standard & Poor’s (S&P), one of the top three credit rating agencies in the world, upgraded the Philippines’ long-term foreign currency- denominated debt from BB+ to BBB-, with a stable outlook. (See definitions of the credit ratings in the article “Moody’s, Fitch, and S&P and what their credit ratings mean“)
Do you know how much your bank is charging you whenever you use your automated teller machine (ATM) to make a withdrawal or balance inquiry in another bank’s ATM?
Be aware, because if you have no idea how much the fees are, they can eat up your total deposit balance.
Investing in the stock market is not easy. It entails doing extensive research, choosing the right stock to trade, and buying and selling at the correct prices.
Your own broker may say BUY a stock, but what if the other brokers were already saying to SELL it? It would be nice to know the opinion of more than one stock broker.
You think a target stock price is overvalued, but how to check if your hunch is correct? It would be nice to know the opinion of more than one stock broker.
You’ve seen so-called stock gurus announce their “stock picks”, but how credible and reliable are they? It would be nice to know the opinion of brokers who are competent stock market analysts.
Millions of college-level students are graduating or have graduated again at this time of the year. Millions of Filipinos, then, will be added to the labor workforce and, if available jobs are not enough to absorb them, would surely increase the country’s unemployment rate.
As of the latest quarter, the Philippine unemployment rate stands at 7.10%. This translates to more than 2.89 million Filipinos without work.
According to Forbes Magazine’s list of the World’s Richest People in 2013, there are 1,426 billionaires this year. That list identifies people having net worth of at least $1 billion. Take note, in dollars!
Out of the 1,426 billionaires, 29 or roughly 2% have the outstanding feat of being part of the list although they have not yet reached the age of 40.
The Philippines is now investment grade.
The news that everyone in the financial markets has been waiting for is finally here. Fitch Ratings announced today that it is upgrading the Philippines’ long-term foreign currency bond rating from BB+ to BBB-, the first notch in investment grade ratings.
Up until a week ago, investors were in euphoria because stocks were reaching new all-time highs. On March 14, 2013, the Dow Jones closed at a record 14,539.14 — a level not seen since pre-subprime mortgage crisis of 2007. Philippine stocks, meanwhile, continued its upsurge, ending at its all-time best of 6,835.21 on March 7, 2013.
And then last week, the market reversed. After reaching a new all-time high, the Dow Jones slid and was unable to return to record levels. The Philippine Stock Exchange index suffered a decline and, as of yesterday, registered its eighth consecutive day of losses.
What happened, you ask? Blame it on the Cyprus financial crisis.
